Bithumb Recovers Part Of Stolen Crypto Coins

Bithumb, the South Korean Cryptocurrency exchange that was hacked a few days ago has claimed to have recovered over $14 million of the stolen funds. This comes after the exchange lost close to $31 million in the hacking incident.

Steps Taken By Bithumb After The Hack

The hacking incident that happened just over a week ago forced the Crypto exchange to stop all deposits and withdrawals.

Bithumb has stated, through a post on its website, that it has already recovered close to half the lost funds ($14 million) and is still making efforts to ensure that they recover most, if not all the lost funds. The outstanding damages now stand at $17 million.

It has explained that the decline in values of the Cryptocurrencies on its platform was largely due to it taking charge of the Cryptographic wallets in a bid to prevent further loss and damages. It has also said that the prevention of further loss of funds, and the recovery made so far, has been made possible by its collaboration with other Cryptocurrency exchanges and foundations across the globe including the Worldwide Cryptographic Exchange and the Cryptographic Fund. It has vowed to continue in its efforts until all damages are recovered.

The Aftermath Of The Incident

Upon discovery of the hack, Bithumb reported the incident to the Korea Internet and Security Agency. It then went on to suspend transactions on the platform as a security measure as well as transferred all the digital currencies to a cold wallet, essentially a computer that is not connected to the Internet. It then went further to advise its users to stop making deposits as they find ways of better securing the system and retrieving the lost funds. It has however reported that many users have and continue to ignore this request.

In a tweet that has since been deleted, Bithumb had also promised to compensate and cover any damages incurred and all affected parties from its own reserves, which has been alleged to hold over $400 million.

Cryptocurrencies That Were Affected

It was reported that a total of eleven different Cryptocurrencies were affected by the hacking incident. A more in-depth breakdown of the number of digital currencies compromised put Bitcoin with the highest value of stolen coins i.e. 2,016

coins translating to a $12million loss. Other digital coins including 5.2 million XRP coins valued at $2.4 million, 2,219 ether coins valued at $950,000, 692 Bitcoin Cash coins worth $487,000 as well as other smaller digital currencies like ELF, HSR and golem were also stolen during the hack.

Withdrawals continue to be limited on the platform while the advice against deposits is still in place. Nevertheless, Bithumb still is among the busiest Crypto exchanges in the world and the second largest exchange in South Korea. Trading is still taking place, albeit at reduced volumes since the hack.

CoinMarketCap has revealed that Bithumb has been responsible for 7.55 percent of the total volume of XRP, worth a total of $27.58 million, trading within the last twenty-four hours.